Note: pictures to be added shortly.

I picked these up on a (very expensive) whim. I don't regret it.

The office building I work in is undergoing a major rebuild, floor-by-floor. I'm on the second floor, and the third (top) floor is currently being demolished for reconstruction. There's a lot of noise (and shaking and bashing and thumping) and it was getting kind of painful on the head to sit through for 8+ hours a day. The construction is also being done to convert the office to a fully open floorplan, meaning no more offices. That means I'm soon going to need a private way to listen to music without bothering my coworkers.
One of the other sysadmins mentioned that some noise cancelling headphones would be really nice around the office right now. He was partly joking, but I thought it was a great idea.
I started doing some research. I hit up wirecutter.com (one of my favorite reviews/recommendations/comparisons websites) and saw that their recommendation was the Bose QC25s. The QC25 is now a generation old, and I STRONGLY dislike Bose's ultra-flat, muddy EQ, so those weren't really an option. I did, however, go test the QC35s as a benchmark. They were extremely comfortable and the noise cancellation was impressive--but it can't be disabled, so they're terrible for any real-world use since there are times where you DO want to hear your surroundings.

I started reading more, and testing different headsets, and fairly quickly, I came across the Sony MDR-1000X. They were right next to a bunch of "Extra Bass" branded Sony headphones, so I almost missed them ("Extra Bass" is to me the audio equivalent of "Extra front-wheel-drive"--I don't want extra bass, I want good EQ. But that's a whole different rant for another time...). Their demo was also completely stupid: You can put the headphones on, but they didn't actually "work" (they were just a demo pair with no noise cancellation, and would only play demo tracks with FAKED NC). I almost didn't buy them, but my inability to buy without researching steered me back to them. I walked out with a black pair.

These things are astounding. They do a lot of things well that I had always assumed were pipe-dream marketing talk and not actually doable. They do a lot of things really well. They do a lot of things I never would have thought to ask of my headphones but, having had those features, now appreciate immensely.

Firstly, they're bluetooth. BT is notorious for quality reduction due to limited throughput, and for crappy battery life. BT 4.0/LE has addressed a lot of these issues, but can't completely solve them. BT is also a 2.4GHz wireless tech, and the 2.4 range is spectacularly overcrowded. Wifi, Bluetooth, microwaves, proprietary wireless tech, oldschool cordless phones, wireless keyboards and mice, professional-grade wireless office headsets...pretty much everything but your mom's knitting needles operate at 2.4GHz. So connections can get iffy in crowded areas, and quality can suffer as signal:noise causes throughput tradeoffs.
But the 1000Xs sound great over bluetooth. Granted, a lot of my listening is from streaming services which serve up compressed, low-bitrate audio anyway, but I've played with high-quality downloads in better codecs and struggle to discern a difference between the quality of these cans in bluetooth mode vs analog via 3.5mm cable (which these headphones also support and include out-of-the-box).

Part of this may be due to their claimed audio upscaling, but I'm not so sure about that. My general experience with audio upscaling (or any kind of "enhancing" effects) is almost universally negative. Usually it broadens the soundstage, but at the expense of making the music brash and sharp in an uncomfortable way. I don't experience that with the 1000Xs. It just sounds like good sound coming through the headphones.
I listen to a lot of rock, blues, bluegrass, folk, and classical music. All of these have something in common: little bass, lots of mids, and hard-to-EQ trebble that can easily go from flat to piercing with just a slight miss-configuration on the EQ side. They all sound excellent on the 1000Xs. These clearly aren't trying to play up the Beats/Skullcandy side of the market, where lots of bass and lots of volume are all that matters. They're looking to sound as neutral and broad-in-scope as possible without losing too much from any single part of the audio spectrum. They do a much better job than other headphones I've used. Bass is most certainly underwhelming compared to even Beats earbuds, but it's not BAD. It's just not the focus of the sound coming through these headphones. It stays where it belongs: as a part of the whole that's pointless without the rest.
I do listen to some metal and a bit of particularly-good electronic music (Solar Fields and similar). Those still sound great. Solar Fields might not be quite as punchy through the 1000Xs as it is in my Lincoln's 12-speaker system with dual subs, but it's still well-reproduced and excellent to listen to.
The highest praise I can give these headphones is that I've discovered aspects of songs (entire instruments) I've never heard anywhere else before. This is thanks to the great EQ combined with the noise cancellation enabling me to really hear what's going on in a song.

So what about the noise cancelling?
I'll tell you what about it: it's phenomenal. It's genuinely eerie. Most people, upon trying good noise-cancelling headphones, find it a little uncomfortable at first. I definitely experienced that, but adjusted to it quickly. My main media room is in the basement of my house, with the closet housing my central air and water heater as well as my "server room" with noisy servers only separated from it by a single door. There's a LOT of white noise in that basement, especially when the furnace is running. There's enough white noise to affect the ideal volume setting on the TV. When I put on the 1000Xs, it all disappears. I can't hear the furnace. I can't hear the water heater pinging. I can't hear the überfans in my network switch or Dell server boxen. I can't hear ANYTHING but what's in the headphones. It's wonderful.
But the real test isn't white noise. It's loud noise, and varied noise. So that's where the office comes into play. While the building is being redone, I share an office with another person. I also listen to construction from directly above all day. We also have a call center downstairs, so I took the headphones in there. There's a ping-pong table right outside my office door that gets pretty loud, especially on Fridays.
The 1000Xs stood up to all of this without a hiccup. The construction got pretty loud. The most I heard with noise cancelling enabled was a faint tapping sound--the human-voice-range frequency left after all the rest of the signal was filtered out of the loud booming sounds from the ceiling.
Voices are where the noise cancellation struggles most, and Sony even notes this on the packaging. This isn't unique to the Sonys, though: everyone struggles here. However, even in our busy call center, there was a dramatic reduction in noise. The voices aren't completely muted, but they are significantly attenuated. It almost sounds like they're coming from down the street or outside a window. They're there, but not immediately so.
Oh, and I should note that all of this noise cancellation commentary is with the headphones turned on, but nothing actually playing. That's how good they are. I actually spent a few hours at work today with the headphones on but no media playing, just for the peace and quiet.
Once you turn on music, any faint noise still making it through to your eardrums is handily buried under even very low volume playback.

The headphones are comfortable, too. Not QUITE as comfortable as the QC35s or QC25s, which have spectacularly-plush foam on the earpieces. But very comfortable. The 1000Xs are a bit lighter than the Bose headsets, but they clamp a little harder with a firmer foam in order to compliment the software noise cancellation with old-fashioned noise isolation. I do worry that they may be a bit huge. I don't have a tiny head, but I wear them at the smallest setting or one notch up. They go a lot bigger. Granted, I have very short hair, so many other people will probably need more adjustment to make room for their 'dos.
The foam in the headband is excellent, and even after hours of use, it's barely noticeable. Usually, that's where I start to feel discomfort with headphones first; where the headband rests on the top of my head. But that's so well done I could probably wear these for days without complaint.

Which is great, because they have a real-world, not-imaginary 20-hour battery life with NC enabled. A few more with it off. 20 hours without a recharge! And once the batteries die, you can still plug in the 3.5 millimeter jack and keep right on truckin'. Unfortunately, like most headsets, you can't use and charge them at the same time, but that's much less of a drawback when you can get through multiple days of normal use without a recharge.

Let's talk about the unexpected aspects of these headphones.

Firstly, there's perhaps the biggest areas where the Sonys set themselves apart from the Boses: Ambient Noise mode.
Ambient Noise mode pipes outside noise in through with your music, so that you can hear what your coworkers are saying, listen to the flight attendant, or whatever else, all without removing the headphones. There are 3 ways to make use of Ambient Noise, and all are so well executed it's astounding.
The first two are accessed via one of the very few buttons on the headset. Press it once, and you get Voice mode. It lets human-voice frequencies through, but continues cancelling everything else. In practice, it lets a lot more office-atmosphere sounds through than just voices, but it does still keep a lot out. In this mode, I could hear some of the construction upstairs, but it was still heavily reduced. What's also impressive is just how "true" this piped-in audio sounds. I expected a delay or distortion or sharpness to it compared to the real thing. But I've spent a lot of time switching between one ear and both ears and just quickly lifting a can away from my ear, and I'm hugely impressed. The voices being piped through are being artificially recreated like a hearing aid, not just "passed through," but they're extremely accurate. The volume is BARELY perceptibly different than the actual volume of the spoken voices. There's a tiny bit of sharpness introduced, but not much. It's really cool. It makes these PERFECT for the office, since you can listen to music, drown out ambience, and still have completely natural conversations (once you've explained to everyone that yes, you can hear them through those headphones).
Press that button again and you get "Normal" mode. Normal mode pipes nearly everything through. This is the "walking down a busy street" or "riding your bike" or "actually doing work you need audio feedback for" mode. It's good. It's not quite as "pure" as the Voice mode. There's some notable sharpness. But it's not painful, and they're fully usable in this mode for long periods of time.
The third way to get Ambient Noise mode is by placing your hand against the back of the right earpiece. This is where all the "controls" live, though not visibly. The right earpiece has a touch surface under the fake leather, and when it's fully covered (the manual suggests cupping your hand over it) it instantly enables full Ambient mode. It's slightly more aggressive than Normal mode, with sounds being piped through at a louder volume. Any media being played back is reduced to very low (but still audible) volume so as not to interfere with conversation, and you can hear everything going on around you just like normal.
Because the 1000Xs use one microphone per earpiece, you still get true-to-life stereo out of piped-through sounds, meaning you don't sacrifice any spatial awareness by using it.
One of the things I like the most about the Normal Ambient mode is the ability to basically convert these headphones into a personal whole-room stereo system. If you reduce the volume of your music to the right point (which, thanks to the great range of these drivers, doesn't reduce the quality at all), you can use Normal Mode to maintain full aural awareness of your surroundings while still enjoying music. The effect is VERY MUCH like listening to a set of speakers in the room--the music doesn't cover anything up. Except that nobody else can hear your music. It's the best of both worlds, and it's WONDERFUL for an office setting and a lot of others.

About those touch controls. They're okay. They're not flawless. "Up" can easily become "left" or "right" if you're not careful, which means I've accidentally skipped track while trying to change volume on multiple occasions. You adapt to them, but one of my rules of design is that if you have to "get used to it" it's not done right. I would prefer buttons, but Sony wanted a clean aesthetic and opted for these instead. The headphones DO look nice. They're not trying to be stylish or cool or grab attention, but they ARE trying to look tasteful enough that you might actually consider wearing them in public.

I've also used the headset for hands-free calls, and feedback from my callers is that they sound quite good for lacking a boom mike. The headset uses one of the noise cancelling mics (I think the right one) to capture your voice. I've been told people can tell I'm on a headset, but that I sound a lot better than I would on speakerphone. My big complaint with these headphones for calling purposes is that there's no mic mute on the headset; you have to mute the call on your phone. A huge issue for anyone shopping for a hands-free headset, but if that's what you're looking for, you can do far better for far less money by buying that type of headset.

Other stuff worth mentioning:
These headphones support AAC (Apple), SBC (standard bluetooth), aptX (Qualcomm--meaning it's used in lots of Android phones), and LDAC (a Sony-proprietary codec that not much stuff supports yet, so mostly useless to most people) and can upscale in all codecs except LDAC.
They fold up pretty small and come with a sculpted case with a stretch pocket to hold your cables.
They are solid enough feeling in build-quality. A couple reviewers mentioned feeling comfortable just throwing them in their bag with their other stuff, but I tend to take better care of my stuff than that, so I appreciate the inclusion of the case.
They have a voice that speaks when changing certain settings, and I wish it could be disabled. It mutes all other audio while playing the voice, which gets irritating once you're used to how those controls work. Fortunately, that only applies to power, NC, and Ambient mode settings. But toggling Ambient modes or Noise Cancellation during a phone call means muting your caller for a couple seconds while the voice tells you what you already know, and that gets old very fast.

These headphones were way outside my "budget" and I do not regret the purchase one bit. I'm enjoying the heck out of them. I can't wait to test the noise cancelling against the snowblower and lawn mower (once summer mercifully rolls back around). I'm finding excuses to listen to music and watch movies--not because I want to get my $400 out of these damn things, but because the listening experience is so outstanding that I want more of it.

MinisterofDOOM wrote:"Extra Bass" is to me the audio equivalent of "Extra front-wheel-drive"--I don't want extra bass, I want good EQ.

I fell out laughing right there, great review. I might start using that negative descriptor from here on out if I can remember it.

There are a few items, to me, that are just worth a couple extra bucks as I see them as an investment. Headphones/earbuds are definitely in that category. Clear crisp audio is, when really experienced, like having power windows in your car. You never want to go back.

Question: have you used other noise-cancelling headphones? If so, how would you compare these to them in terms of sonic quality and noise-cancellation?

Reason I ask. I have had two Bose products in the past (when they were about the only ones that did a good job of noise-cancellation). But, the last one was stolen on a plane flight (mostly my fault). So, I bought a cheaper Audio Technica ATH-ANC7B as a replacement.

Unfortunately, one of the problems of buying over the Internet is that you cant always be sure of how you might like a product. These AT headphones are uncomfortable and the headband does not allow the cups to lower enough to fit well. Finally, the audio quality is mediocre.

I have suffered with them long enough and am thinking about replacing them sometime early next year, but the price of the Sony at $399 is a big deterrent. I use expensive planar headphones (Audeze) for home listening and the noise-cancelling ones would be for travel. I'd be quite irritated if I lost it on a flight ...

But, if the quality (sound and cancellation) is worth it, I may take a deep sigh and get one.

Z

I tried the Bose in the store, but haven't used any in normal use situations. Based on that brief experience, I don't have a hard time believing most of the MDR-1000X reviews that say Sony's noise cancellation is JUST perceptibly superior to the QC35s. Probably, if you prefer the Bose for comfort and audio, the two are so incredibly close that you'll be equally happy either way. But if you're not set on the Bose, the Sonys will give you better audio along with slightly better noise cancellation that can be disabled by degrees (something the QC35s still lack).

The MDR-1000Xs are $50 more than the QC35s, though, so that may also be a major factor. I think their much broader featureset (without sacrificing anything) is worth that extra cost, though, especially since you're already spending ridiculous amounts by the time you start considering the QC35s.

The Sony's earcups and headband are extremely adjustable. There's a lot of rotation across three axes and a lot of adjustability in band size. While not as soft as the QC35s, I think they do a better job of fitting to my head. I've worn them for several hours at a time with VERY little fatigue or pain. One of two things starts to drive me nuts with headphones, usually after less than 30 minutes: either the ear cups pressing on my ears start to hurt subtly but in an infinitely increasing way, or the headband starts pressing into my head in that same subtle-but-intense kind of way. I get neither from the Sonys no matter how long I wear them. We're testing Sennheiser's equivalent (PCX550, I think) at the office and those ear cups are wrongly shaped and sized and start to hurt almost immediately. I think the QC35 and Sony are the only two headphones I've ever worn that genuinely qualify as comfortable and not merely tolerable.

(Sorry for my late response).

Thanks for the information!

To my ears, the earlier Bose (both the ones I had and the third-gen that I listened to) were sonically inferior to good headphones - but I will go listen to the QC35 to see if they have improved the sound quality over the older products.

Yeah, active noise-cancellation can lead to poorer audio quality, so I don't expect perfection compared to my expensive audio phones, but the degradation on the Bose were bad enough that I did not replace my lost one with the QC15.

The new Sony seems like it can be quite selective. Meaning full cancellation is only used for when I want just cancellation (i.e., not actively listening to music or a movie on the plane). If I can then reduce the cancellation in favor of audio quality at other times when I am listening to music, that may be the feature that makes it a good deal for me!

FWIW, a former boss had a Bose professional noise-cancellation headset (with boom microphone) - which he used it when piloting his small plane - and those were awesome! Tweakable levels of noise-cancellation using a control knob and optimal for his flying as a pilot. But expensive as hell too! And not designed for music, of course ...

Z